


Coffee Shop AU Ficbit

by anoldaccount



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-08
Updated: 2015-01-08
Packaged: 2018-03-06 16:16:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3140744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anoldaccount/pseuds/anoldaccount
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cullen decides a walk and something hot to drink will help cut through the withdrawal shakes. His boss helps him put off what seems like an inevitable fall and failure.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Coffee Shop AU Ficbit

**Author's Note:**

> Unbeta'd and written at 2 A.M. Further notes at end.

The wind outside the Herald's Rest coffee shop and bookstore had those three-in-the-morning teeth that bit straight through his favorite coat, the one that everyone mocked for the red fur collar. Maybe the bite was worse for the sweat dripping down him. At least it took the edge off the waves of heat, the feeling like a handful of rusty nails sat in his gut.

As the bell rang overhead, Cassandra looked at him levelly from a nearby table, clicking her tablet off and sliding it to the side.

He avoided her gaze. Cullen hadn't expected the manager to be there, but it was just as well.

The counter was held by Leliana. He wobbled in front of her, sweating cold, and tried to squint at the menu he ought to know by heart.

"Your glasses are on your head." she said, dry.

He squeezed his eyes shut hard and pinched the bridge of his nose. "It doesn't matter. Just-- something hot and strong, please. I'd appreciate if it wasn't too sweet."

"You should sit down before you fall over." she advised.

He'd hoped the place would be nearly empty. Could have gone to a Starbucks, somewhere nobody knew him, but his feet had taken him down the sidewalks in a route he could have gone in his sleep. The smell of the shop, the way the lights fell on the displays, the way the rich rugs on stone floor soaked up sound-- it was home. The emergency mattress in the office closet was more comfortable than the bed in his too-empty apartment. It would be hard to leave it behind.

Krem and Bull were studiously trading Calculus notes in the corner, still sounding half-drunk from what was undoubtedly an immense bender. Their over-loud voices made the waves of blinding pressure in his head roll harder, faster. Envy ate at him.

Varric typed rapidly at his ridiculous custom gaming laptop.

There was a faint impression of a blond boy in a terrible hipster hat that he thought he might have seen before. What's-his-name. The thought rattled in his head and was quickly buried under the rest of them.

His glasses clicked on the table top and he fought the waves of nausea and shame, of greed and want. An urge to smash the napkin dispenser off the table, to break the sugar and cinnamon shakers, anything to get the desperation out of him, crashed in. He pushed it down.

"Your shift is not for six more hours. You are having a bad night, I assume." said Cassandra, leaning forward on her elbows and lacing her hands. The careful stoicism on her face made the feeling of shame reach deeper.

He cradled his face in a hand. "I know-- I know I can't just quit. But I think that it's time to give my notice."

"A lot here depends on you." she said, a little sharp. "You are integral. What do you think the next few weeks will be like if you are not here?"

"What do you think they'll be like if I can't handle this?" he asked more loudly than he intended. The sound crashed through his throbbing head and he shook harder.

She slammed her hands flat on the table. "You are stronger than you think!" she nearly shouted. "I will accept your resignation if it is truly by your choice, but if it is some kind of self-punishment out of shame--"

The cup clicked in front of him. Leliana's inscrutable smile hovering over seemed to shake the aggression out of her. "You are in no state to be having this discussion." Cassandra bit out. "We will continue this when you are less...unwell."

"What if I don't get 'less unwell'?" he said, frustrated. "I--"

"I hate to interrupt," said Leliana, "but it appears Sera's been in the stock room again. I'm afraid I can't leave the counter for long, so I could really use you off break, Cassandra."

By the look on her face, butter wouldn't melt in her mouth, but Cassandra just harrumph'd and gave the table another rattle for emphasis.

The temporary peace seemed nearly blessed. He rubbed at the coin in his pocket and breathed in the steam from the drink. When he wrapped his hands around it, the warm helped loosen them, making the tremors a little more gentle.

It burned and was smooth and a little bitter, precious on his tongue. When his stomach lurched in protest, he sullenly took a bigger gulp. It helped cut through the fog and the razor-laced cotton-stuffed feeling in his head.

He let himself shut his eyes and take a deep breath, counting backward as he tried to convince his twisting, knotting muscles to loosen, tried to suppress the shakes.

When he opened them, as if by magic the room seemed dimmer and quieter. He stared into his coffee and watched the foam swirl while trying to ground himself in the there-and-then using the exercises his therapist had taught him, feeling the familiar wood grain of the table and the weight of his boots connecting to the floor.

Someone slid into the chair in front of him. He felt irritation spike and looked up, expecting to see Cassandra ready to resume the argument. It wasn't a new one, but it had been a while since the last time and he'd never been so certain before.

He'd asked her to watch him and make the call if he seemed to be crumbling, not trusting himself to do the right thing. His trust had been best placed in himself after all.

When no more words came, he looked up to see Lavellan staring at him intently and jumped a bit in his seat.

It hadn't been his imagination. The lights were dimmer, and Krem and Bull were very poorly attempting to stage whisper about some arcane and terrifying-sounding mathematics. Varric's hands on the keyboard were slower and less emphatic.

"I couldn't help but overhear." she said, sounding completely unapologetic. She was in those awful bedazzled beige pajamas that she wore around the first and main store. Her little empire, full of coffee beans, a diverse and colorful array of hungover college students, and questionable sandwiches.

He felt a blush rise up, the bile churning in his stomach.

She waited.

"I'm afraid I'll start taking my rescue med again." he said, looking up at the ceiling. "And I'm afraid that if I start taking it again, I'll lose control again. But I'm already going out of control without it."

"You haven't been sleeping." It wasn't a question. "The flashbacks have been getting worse. And the migraines."

"Is it that obvious?" he asked. He'd hoped his impairment wasn't getting noticeable, but if it was, then it was far past time that he should have given notice.

She shook her head. "If I didn't know you, I wouldn't have suspected."

"Please." he said miserably. "I'm afraid I'll become a liability. What should I do?"

Lavellan tilted her head. "What do you want? What would you choose?"

"I don't want to go back to it." he said. "I don't want to see what happened before happen again. It's-- I know it's not bad, or wrong, but I know that it's bad for me. I just don't know if I can handle this without it. If I'm a fool for being scared of it or if I'm a fool for considering it."

Gently, she laid her hands over his and looked him in the eyes.

"What you want is important. There's nothing to be ashamed of, here. Either way." she said firmly. "There's nothing wrong with you if you can't get by without it. There's also nothing wrong with you for choosing not to take it because you don't want to."

"I'm scared." he said quietly. "I don't want to see everything we've worked so hard to build fall because I stayed even though I'm compromised."

"This isn't about the store. This is about you." Her hands tightened over his. "If the stress of the job is hurting you, that's one thing. But if it's about the quality of your work? Someone would have noticed if you were doing a bad job. And you're not alone. If you're struggling and need a break, we can delegate more to the employees you've been training. You work harder and do far more than I'd expect anyone to."

He snorted a little, feelings shuffling around this new idea. "I still work a lot less than you do."

That startled a laugh out of her. "I should probably take my own advice." she admitted. "Anyway, you're not alone when it comes to friends, too. You give a lot of support. Let some of us give back."

He ran a thumb over her hands. They were small, looked delicate, but were firm and warm, with subtle callouses.

"I can try." he said. "Maybe I'm not ready to give up, after all."

The caffeine and the talk helped smooth over some of the edges in his brain, and he quietly filed away flits of ideas about who was ready for a little more authority, who he might call the next time the nightmares sent him up in the wee hours, about how maybe the new regular med would settle in if he gave it a little more time and he should bring up the problems at therapy.

"Thank you." he added. "I-- thank you. I always seem to feel better after talking to you."

She gave a small, tender smile, looking up at him warmly. "Anytime."

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this at two in the morning to send privately to fill a friend's open request. Decided to post it on a whim.
> 
> I'd like to write more about Cullen's experiences with PTSD and addiction as someone who's dealt with those things personally. For those unfamiliar, rescue meds are emergency-only downers that basically numb you to just about everything. Most people sleep through a heavy dose. They can make some daily medications fail to work gradually or immediately. In some people they're an addiction risk and/or trigger off suicidal intent, and an overdose risk if you develop tolerance and have to take them too frequently for severe symptoms. I can't take them for literally all the previous reasons.
> 
> I thought I'd leave it open-ended what the specific med is and what went wrong with his taking it. I'm sure as hell not knocking that category of meds, because they help a lot of people. For a few people, they don't go well, and it seemed like the closest analogue I could write about to compare to the Lyrium-- necessary, does a lot of good, can be involved in disasters and do bad too, and the conflict and dissonance when a tool for good can have bad and painful effects as well.


End file.
